In the largest-scale competition the energy-efficient home design team has participated in to date, the RISD SOLAR team took 16th place out of 18 at the second Solar Decathlon on the National Mall in Washington Friday.
Attributing its disappointing score to a lack of funds, manpower and experience, the RISD team, which included several Brown students, nonetheless celebrated the innovations of its solar-powered house as well as its participation in RISD's first national contest.
The Solar Decathlon competition, brainchild of the Department of Energy's Richard King, challenges participating teams to design and build a solar-powered home that integrates the principles of energy efficiency and architectural aesthetics. King, now Solar Decathlon director, "envisioned this student competition where engineering and architecture would work together," said John Horst of the DOE. Since the houses are judged in 10 different categories ranging from "Architecture" to "Comfort Zone" to "Lighting," houses must provide inhabitants with all the conveniences of any comparable modern home, including running water, ample electricity and comfortable living space.
Each participating team has two years to plan and build its house, which ultimately must be taken apart, transported to Washington and rebuilt on the Mall for the 10-day competition.
Assembly began Sept. 29, and judging began after the opening ceremony Oct. 6. Houses were open to the public for tours and education about renewable energy throughout the competition.
The 18 teams included universities from across the United States as well as international entries from Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Concordia University and Université de Montréal.
The University of Colorado took first place for the second time with a score of 853.716 out of a possible 1,100. Cornell University followed with 826.039, and California Polytechnic State University came in third with 809.13. RISD finished with 571.492 points.
RISD was the lone art school in this year's competition and the only institution without an engineering program to enter. The competition "leaves RISD on a higher level," said architecture alum Cristina Zancani-Tabena RISD '05, a team leader.
RISD SOLAR's house was first built on South Water Street this past summer and was open to the Providence public in late September before disassembly and transportation down to Washington.
About 60 students were involved in the project over the past two years, Zancani-Tabena said, although about 10 students made up the final team that went to Washington. That team included two Brown students, Christian O'Mara '06 and Matthew Willse '06, who were in charge of all plumbing, heating and cooling. Other Brown students have helped with engineering aspects of the house throughout the project.
Another Brown student, Robert Rutherford '05.5, traveled back and forth between Washington and Providence during the competition to film a documentary about RISD SOLAR for MC 150, Sec. 2: "Problems of Documentary."
One of the strongest features of the RISD design were the louvers, accordion-like sheets of silver folded along the house. The louvers lower the energy needed to heat or cool the home by directing sunlight toward or away from the house walls, said John Smith RISD '05, who graduated with an architecture degree. A system of computers tracks the movement of the sun and adjusts the louvers accordingly. Other strengths of the design included the rooftop flower garden and the "phase change material" used in the heating system.
The RISD team emphasized the aesthetic importance of its rooftop garden, which they said echoed the competition's principle of "green energy" by recalling a natural setting. Demonstrating RISD's artistic edge, the team even chose a specific kind of purple flower to match the color of the hot water tank on the rooftop.
RISD's innovative heating and cooling system involved substances called "phase change materials," salts that have a high capacity to retain heat. On hot days, heat absorbed by a rooftop water tank is piped to bricks of one type of salt. The bricks act as a thermostat, releasing the heat through a pipe system when needed. On cool days and at night, another type of salt with a high freezing point acts "like an ice pack," freezing and releasing cold air as needed on hot days, Smith said.
This material "is totally renewable," he said. "It never wears out. Ever."
Unfortunately, RISD's heating and cooling system never got a chance to compete due to heavily overcast weather during the competition. Though the RISD design incorporated "a very, very efficient solar array," an entire week of rain meant too little sunlight charged the panels, losing RISD points for its heating systems, Zancani-Tabena said.
RISD lacked an effective backup electrical system for cloudy days. "The majority of people that won knew that they needed storage banks," Zancani-Tabena said.
The need for battery backup favored Colorado, Horst said. "They were the quickest team to adjust their strategy to cloudy weather. ... They had the best use of the stored energy in their batteries." Horst said the house was ready for cloudy days because "a lot of design was meant for" Colorado, where skies are often overcast.
RISD was also held back by a lack of financial support and sheer manpower, Zancani-Tabena said. The number of RISD team members at Washington hovered around 10 people, she said, while other teams numbered as high as 50. And while RISD's budget was about $350,000, "most of the budgets on the Mall were half a million to a million dollars," she said.
About two-thirds, or $230,000, of RISD's budget came from private donations. The Rhode Island Renewable Energy Fund donated about $72,000 to the project.
In the next competition, the DOE will attempt to level the playing field by increasing each team's stipend to $100,000, Horst said. This is a twenty-fold increase from the $5,000 the DOE gave each team as financial startup this year.
Public turnout exceeded expectations, Horst said, especially in light of the poor weather. About 125,000 visitors toured the houses, according to Horst.
Zancani-Tabena said, "I'm amazed at how the public responded to this. ... It was pouring for a whole week and people were waiting in line to get into every single house."
One of the goals of the competition is to generate new ideas for commercial development of solar homes. Developers were among those touring the houses and expressed interest in potentially purchasing designs, Horst said. "It's a learning environment for the general public as well as for residential home builders in general," he said.
RISD's house will not be on display immediately after its return to Providence. The team hopes to reassemble it by April and open it to the public for educational purposes, since the RI Renewable Energy Fund's grant was conditional on the house being open to the Providence public for two years after the competition.
